Favorite Schools

Favorite Teams

Michigan

Change Region

comments

On tour, Gabby Giffords' actions speak on gun control

gabby-giffords-tour-promo.jpg

In this photo taken Friday, July 5, 2013, former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, retired astronaut and combat veteran Capt. Mark Kelly, arrive to meet with local supporters and parents of Sandy Hook Elementary School victims at the Orchard Street Chop Shop in Dover, N.H. Three years after being shot in the head, Giffords is in New Hampshire to urge support for background checks on gun purchases. (AP Photo/Mary Schwalm)

DOVER, N.H. (AP) — Thirty months after she was shot
through the head, former Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords sits
in a New Hampshire restaurant facing parents of children killed in the
nation's latest school shooting.

They are here to talk political strategy, but Giffords doesn't say much. She doesn't have to.

The
43-year-old Democrat has become the face of the fight for gun control —
a woman now known as much for her actions as her words as she recovers
from a 2011 attack that forever changed her life and ended six others.
Giffords has already traveled more than 8,000 miles this week, her
husband, retired astronaut Mark Kelly, at her side, encouraging
political leaders from Alaska to Maine to have the courage to defy the
National Rifle Association.

"I don't think any of us thought this
was going to be easy," Kelly tells three parents of children killed in
the Newton, Conn., school shootings, with Giffords next to him, nodding
her agreement. "This is not going to be a quick fix. But we're trying."

The
couple is in the midst of a seven-state-in-seven-day tour across
America, meeting with allies and opponents alike to generate momentum
for federal legislation that would expand background checks on gun
purchases. It's a scaled-back version of a broad legislative package to
ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines proposed in the
aftermath of the Newtown shooting rampage that left 20 children dead. It
was defeated in the Senate in April and has stalled in a divided
Congress now preparing for its summer recess.

On Saturday,
Giffords and Kelly had lunch with former President George H.W. Bush and
his wife, Barbara, at their estate in Kennebunkport, Maine. Bush, 89,
resigned from the NRA in 1995, citing its response to the Oklahoma City
bombing.

Giffords' cross-country trek is the centerpiece of a
summertime campaign designed to pressure elected officials in their own
backyards. At the same time, her recently formed super PAC and related
nonprofit group have ambitious plans to expand their political clout
through the 2014 midterm elections and beyond. Organizers say that the
group, known as Americans for Responsible Solutions, is expected to
raise at least $20 million to fuel paid television ads and political
activities to coincide with the next election, the next gun control vote
or both.

So far, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has
bankrolled much of the campaign to expand background checks through his
own organization, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, pouring more than $12
million into advertising designed to pressure lawmakers in places like
New Hampshire, Arizona and Arkansas.

But this week, Giffords and
Kelly are playing a more personal role. They are eating pie, sharing
hugs and having frank conversations to connect with voters in
traditional gun-owning states whose leaders have been largely reluctant
to support expanded background checks in the face of NRA opposition.

And they are shooting guns to help make their point.

Kelly,
a former Navy pilot whose parents were police officers, purchased a new
rifle — he said it was his sixth or seventh gun — at the Village Gun
Shop in New Hampshire's north country on Friday. He waited less than
five minutes for a background check and later tested his Savage .30-06
bolt-action rifle at a nearby shooting range. Giffords joined him at a
Nevada shooting range earlier in the week, firing a gun for the first
time since a mentally ill man took aim at her and opened fire in a
Tucson, Ariz., shopping center as she met with constituents. Jared Lee
Loughner, 24, was sentenced in November to seven consecutive life
sentences, plus 140 years, after he pleaded guilty to 19 federal charges
in the case.

It's an attack that Kelly refers to often, using
phrases like, "what happened to Gabby" and "when my wife was shot." The
couple is traveling with a handful of guns packed in a suitcase — all
for personal use on their trip.

Sandy Holz, the shop's owner in
Whitefield, N.H., says she's reluctant to endorse broad gun control
legislation but would support a bill to requiring background checks for
sales at gun shows and on the Internet, as the failed Senate bill would
have done.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll in mid-May found that
67 percent of Americans felt the Senate wrongly rejected the background
check bill.

A Pew Research Center poll conducted in early May
found 81 percent favor making private gun sales and sales at gun shows
subject to background checks, support that transcends party lines.
Another 73 percent of respondents said that if the background check bill
were brought up for another vote, Congress should pass it.

But there is little sign of movement in Washington.

Despite
Giffords' and Bloomberg's continued lobbying, none of the bill's
proponents report winning a single new vote since the measure's April
defeat. If anything, their task may have grown more difficult since the
death last month of Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., who supported the
checks. He has been replaced by Republican Sen. Jeff Chiesa, whose view
on the subject is unclear.

Giffords and Kelly say they will not give up despite obvious health concerns.

More
than two years after the attack, Giffords travels with nurses and a
speech therapist, a rarely used wheelchair in tow. Her right leg and arm
are partially paralyzed. She walks on her own, her right leg dragging
slightly, and she climbs stairs, often with Kelly or a staff member
holding her left hand.

The brain injury has also affected her ability to speak.

Giffords
offers enthusiastic, but slightly slurred stump speeches on the tour,
in a halting style that sometimes brings tears to the eyes of her
audience — and her staff.

"We must never stop fighting. Fight.
Fight. Fight. Be bold, be courageous, the nation is counting on you,"
she said at a Friday press conference joined by New Hampshire law
enforcement officials.

The entire speech, just 62 words, lasted less than a minute.

The
cross-country tour is run with the efficiency and detail of a
presidential campaign, with schedules planned down to the minute.
Surrounded by a handful of young staffers and her service dog, Nelson,
Giffords and Kelly use private planes and at times helicopters,
visiting venues usually frequented by politicians.

After her
Friday speech, Giffords and Kelly stopped for ice cream. As she often
does, Giffords expressed herself more with body language than words as
they decided what to eat. She tapped her finger on the menu and said,
"Apple pie."

She was greeted warmly by a steady flow of customers
and restaurant staff, offering them a hug and responding to their praise
with a simple "Thank you very much."

They visited New Hampshire
to help remind voters that Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte opposed the
background check measure. They spent Saturday in Maine and end their
tour Sunday in North Carolina.

Giffords and Kelly know
they will face continued opposition, although it sometimes has come in
more intimidating forms on the tour.

Giffords exited one event
through a back entrance to avoid a small group of protesters, including
one carrying an AR-15 assault rifle. Shortly before they left, the man
appeared to be napping in the shade with his gun at his side.

"Apparently,
he got tired," Kelly later said at the dinner with Newtown parents.
"You can't sleep when you've got your loaded AR-15 next to you. This is
not responsible."